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The Morning Porch

Daily short takes from an Appalachian hollow

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banjo

September 12, 2025August 6, 2010 by Dave Bonta

A wood pewee snaps an insect out of the air, lands and sings, his mournful notes the only thing audible over my uncle’s banjo.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags banjo, eastern wood pewee 1 Comment
January 31, 2010 by Dave Bonta

Walking naked through the cold house at dawn, I’m startled by a bright light among the trees on the western ridge: the moon, big as a banjo.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags banjo, moon 2 Comments
October 15, 2008 by Dave Bonta

A winter wren’s wandering burble from above the dry creek. A visitor brings out his old-time banjo and tunes it with an electronic tuner.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags banjo, stream, winter wren

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On This Day

  • January 12, 2025
    Not far below freezing. The sun appears through a keyhole in the clouds. A gray squirrel reaches into the snow and extracts a black walnut.
  • January 12, 2024
    The Carolina wren who sleeps above my laundry-room door forms a one-bird cheering section for the sunrise. Then the cloud-lid closes, and only the creek…
  • January 12, 2023
    Fog prolongs the dawn well past sunrise. How long will squirrels keep scolding after a cat has slunk away? Ten minutes and counting.
  • January 12, 2021
    A mixed flock of winter birds flitting though the yard. The mockingbird comes flying over the house and joins them at a half-frozen seep.
  • January 12, 2020
    A yellow gash appears in the clouds to the east and heals up again. The cardinal attacks his reflection. Military jets howl over, unseen.

See all...

Related book

Cover of Ice Mountain with a linocut of a big ridgetop tree.

What I do after I sit on the porch. One winter and spring's daily walks distilled into short poems with linocut illustrations by Beth Adams.

Header image: detail from Paper Garden by Clive Hicks-Jenkins (used by permission)

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